The town of my dreams and a scaredy-dog: Paradise from Pucon to Punta Arenas

I’m in love with Pucon! I want to move there and learn Spanish properly and get old and grey in a little house like this, that catches the sun in the afternoons and warms my sheets on the line as I bake pies for the community.

We stayed in this awesome hostel which was more like a cosy wooden house with a fireplace, called Paradise Pucon with crazy Kiwi Dave and his dog Pecos, who’s afraid of bridges (Pecos, not Dave). On our volcano walk we managed to coax Pecos over a huge bridge covered in snow, where we found EVEN MORE SNOW. Here they are frolicking on Villarica, because everyone likes to frolic on the side of an active volcano… especially one that’s due for an eruption.

Dave and Pecos took me to the caves yesterday so I could get right inside the mouth of the devil, which is what the locals call Vilarica. Pecos was barking so loud he started an avalanche but luckily it was on the other side of the volcano to where we were and we didn’t die. Shame about the llamas who fell off elsewhere.

Being the outdoorsy people we are (ahem) we also went on a FUN bike ride!

You really can’t beat the scenery in Pucon. Dave is going to start a separate bike tour business soon and you should probably go with him, not just because he knows some new, kick-ass trails that no one else knows or rides on, but because Pecos always stays with him and if there’s a problem with a bridge along the way, he’ll be able to tell you.

It’s also really nice drinking wine in Pucon. Look! The wine glasses are so big you can fit entire volcanoes inside them.

Sigh. It was sad to have to leave Pucon, but on the plane on the way to Punta Arenas, we saw scenery like this, which got us all excited about seeing glaciers and Torres del Paine and penguins and maybe even a beaver dam when we get on the Stella cruise to Ushuaia in a few days.

That’s all snow by the way, not clouds! Amaaaaazing. Well worth the $500 one-way plane ride from Santiago (gah!!)

We won’t have Pecos to guide us as we explore the “uttermost End of the Earth” but we will have some super sexy second hand aqua-marine ski pant all-in-ones thanks to Pucon’s vintage clothing stores… but there’s more about all that coming up in Latinalicious – The South American Diaries* of course.